at war. The first flush
of recruiting had passed, and hundreds of thousands of our finest young
men had volunteered for the Army. But a kind of apathy had settled
upon the nation, and fellows who should have come forward willingly
hung back.

I had been fairly successful in my recruiting campaign; nevertheless I
was often disappointed at the lack of enthusiasm manifested. I found
that young men gave all sorts of foolish excuses as reasons for not
joining; and when this stranger volunteered, as it seemed to me,
unthinkingly, and without realizing the gravity of the step he was
taking, I hesitated.

'Of course you understand that you are doing a very important thing?' I
said. 'We are at war, and fellows who volunteer know that they are
possibly volunteering for death.'

'Oh yes, of course.' He said this in what seemed to me such a casual
and matter-of-fact way that I could not believe he realized what war
was.

'The casualty list is already becoming very serious,' I continued.
'You see, we are having to send out men after a very short training,
and thus it comes about that the lads who, when war broke out, never
dreamed of being soldiers, are now, many of them, either maimed and
crippled for life, or dead. You quite realize what you are doing?'

'Certainly,' he replied, 'but then, although I have forgotten nearly
everything else, I have not forgotten that I am an Englishman, and of
course, as an Englishman, I could do no other than offer myself to my
country. Still, I'd like to know the exact nature of our quarrel with
Germany.'

'You've not forgotten there is such a country as Germany, then?'

'Oh, no.' And then he sighed, as if trying to recollect something. 'I
say,' he went on, 'my mind is a curious business. I know that Germany
is a country in Europe. I can even remember the German language. I
know that Berlin is the capital of the country, and I can recall the
names of many of their big towns,--Leipzig, Frankfurt, Munich,
Nuremburg; I have a sort of fancy that I have visited them; but I know
nothing of the history of Germany,--that is all a blank. Funny, isn't
it?' and then he sighed again.

'As it happens,' I said, 'I have to speak at a recruiting meeting
to-night, here in Plymouth. Would you like to come? I am going to
deal with the reasons for the war, and to show why it is every chap's
duty to do his bit.'

'I'd love to come. My word! what's that?'

Away in the distance there was a s